Follow the Money: Pork-Powered Pig Preps for Flight

Whenever Marine One lifts off from the south lawn of the White House, identical decoy helicopters go with it, quickly trading places in a complex, evasive maneuver known as the presidential shell game.

The shifting formation is aimed at confusing potential attackers, a concern that reached a fever pitch after 9/11. It could just as easily apply to the corporations jockeying to replace the aging Marine One fleet — a boondoggle that’s wasted billions and fattened politicians’ war chests for years, as a short list of well-connected players maneuver to build a custom rotary aircraft deemed safe enough to fly the president through almost any crisis, even a nuclear blast.

The Marine One upgrade has played out from the start as classic pork-barrel politics. Portrayed as urgent, it has been bedeviled by delays and cost overruns, with contractors playing musical chairs for a seat at the table all the while.

“The president’s helicopter should be based on national security and sensible budgeting. Instead, it is being decided on who’s funding which politicians to stay in power, and about jobs in one district versus jobs in another,” said Daniel Newman, executive director of MAPLight.org, nonpartisan money-tracking organization. “Basically, we have a broken system where paying for politicians to be elected and stay in office is what it takes to win favorable contracts.”

Net neutrality, intellectual property, wireless spectrum, export laws and pollution regulations might rise to the top of any list of key tech-lobbying issues. Less scrutinized are the daily battles for pork that grease the wheels of government spending everywhere, and prove the adage that politics is the art of legally transferring wealth from one group of interests to another.

Operable in urban environment “without damage to the landing environment or injury to nearby personnel.”

Two communication systems, one for the president one for crew “capable of supporting secure and nonsecure voice, video, VTC and data communications using both narrow-band and wide-band communications with an integrated ICS system.”

Survive “perceivable threats and continue operations.”

Maintain cabin temperature between 68 and 76 degrees.

“Commode with a flush capability.”

How much does it cost?

How long will it last?

You’ll need plenty of grease, elbow or otherwise, to produce this modern wonder. Start by greasing the halls of Congress. To help recoup your costs, buy a $10 toilet seat from Home Depot, and charge the government $10,000.

In this, the first in an occasional series examining tech influence in politics using MAPLight’s nonpartisan political-finance–analysis tools, the trail leads to a mind boggling, 10-year campaign in which three key defense contractors have funneled more than $18 million to the pockets of federal lawmakers, to win various military contracts, including one for what can best be described as the government equivalent of the Bat-copter.

Now a detailed look at campaign finance records connected to the Marine One contracts, undertaken for the first time by Wired.com and MAPLight.org, shows a flurry of corporate contributions from Lockheed rivals to lawmakers involved in the decision-making immediately before and after the deal was grounded. And with a government call for new proposals for a revised contract expected next year, pay-to-play contributions to win the coveted deal continue to flow unabated, records show.

MAPLight is a 5-year-old nonprofit based in Berkeley, California. Thanks to MAPLight’s tools, which are fueled by data from the Center for Responsive Politics of Washington, D.C., we can not only track the amount of money spent, but see the timing of payments related to legislative work, such as votes, or pressure from politicians to kill an existing contract and hand it to a friend.

In addition to keeping tabs on tech-related pork and lobbying, we are unveiling today a new campaign-finance–tracking widget, in conjunction with MAPLight and based on CRP data, to help shine a general spotlight on politicians and their contributors. (See related story).

Hail to the Chief

The jockeying for the Marine One contract began in earnest a decade ago after the 2001 terror attacks. Capt. Cate Mueller, a spokeswoman for the Navy, which is supervising the stalled project, said a new Marine One fleet was “critical” to the nation’s security. Some choppers in the current fleet are more than three decades old.

Specifications for the new Marine One chopper are classified. But public documents show the new craft must at minimum carry a sort of miniature Oval Office, with two independent communications systems, including encrypted video conferencing; have at least two engines, and be capable of flying with a failed engine; and be equipped with a missile-defense system and nuclear-fallout reflector capabilities. Together, these enhancements will make it the most advanced flying machine of its type in the world, should it ever arrive.Sikorsky Aircraft was believed to be the leading contender, having already produced the current presidential fleet, consisting of 11 Sikorsky VH-3D Sea Kings and eight Sikorsky VH-60N Black Hawks.

At the time, Navy acquisition chief John Young said Lockheed Martin and AgustaWestland prevailed because they were deemed more likely “to meet government requirements on schedule, with lesser risk, and at lower cost.”

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Show Me the Money

Young’s statement would quickly unravel. What ultimately was true was that the winning bidder had donated the most money to politicians.

In all, since 2001, Sikorsky and its parent — United Technologies of Hartford, Connecticut — and their employees have given $3.25 million to candidates in office. Lockheed comes in at $8.2 million. (AgustaWestland has been a two-bit donor to U.S. federal lawmakers, having given $32,050 since 2002.)

Jeffery Adams, a Lockheed spokesman, said the company’s political action committee backs those who support, among other initiatives, “a strong national defense.”

Winning the award turned out to be just the start of Lockheed and AgustaWestland’s struggles, as expenses ballooned amid delays and numerous design changes ordered by the Navy. Four years and $3 billion later, cost overruns emboldened critics: Sikorsky was back knocking at the doors of friendly politicians for a second chance, as was a new rival, Boeing. Both had checkbooks in hand.

Just months before the Pentagon scrubbed Lockheed’s contract, six Connecticut federal lawmakers sent a letter to Navy Secretary Donald Winter expressing alarm over the program’s “significant cost overruns.”

The letter offered an alternative.

“Sikorsky is a tested and proven prime contractor for the Marine One fleet. In addition, Sikorsky maintains the most stringent security requirements for its Marine One aircraft and facilities, with minimal reliance on foreign components and designs,” Sen. Christopher Dodd (D) and Democratic Reps. Rosa DeLauro, John Larson, Joe Courtney, Christopher Murphy and James Himes wrote Winter on February 11, 2009.

What that six-paragraph letter failed to mention was that Sikorsky (based in Stratford, Connecticut) and its parent had given hundreds of thousands of dollars to these lawmakers in campaign contributions.

Sikorsky and United Technology’s biggest benefactor is Dodd, the Connecticut senator who has reaped more than $255,000 from the companies and its employees in the past decade.

What’s more, some substantial contributions came just weeks before the letter was posted and shortly after it was sent, MAPLight’s analysis shows.

DeLauro spearheaded the letter. Her district includes Sikorsky’s headquarters. She received $49,600 before the letter and another $10,000 following it. “I have always believed that Sikorsky and its workers are best positioned to provide the new fleet of helicopters,” she said in April.

Himes got $5,000 from the company right before the letter was forwarded to the Navy. The Democrat also got another $9,250 in the first half of 2010 from Sikorsky and United Technologies.

Courtney, who is up for re-election Nov. 2, received $5,000 from United Technologies and its employees just a month after the letter was sent. In total, the Democrat has received more than $26,000 from Sikorsky, its parent and employees.

“We want to support the politicians that believe in the same values that we do. For instance, a strong national defense — we believe that is important,” said Paul Jackson, a spokesman for Sikorsky, when asked about the contributions for this report.

Nor was Sikorsky the only player ramping up its Marine One game in 2009, the year the original Lockheed contract was trashed.

Boeing and its employees gave more than $60,000 that year to almost every active federal lawmaker in Pennsylvania, where it likely will assemble the Marine One fleet if awarded a contract. That was the most Boeing has doled out annually in that state since 2001, the earliest date for which it MAPLight has accumulated data.

“If someone is in office or running for office and is supportive of issues that we find supportive of our position, clearly, we’d like to see them in a position of power,” said Doug Kennett, a spokesman for Chicago-based Boeing.

Dodd, Courtney, Himes, DeLauro, Larson and Murphy did not respond for comment.

Money Spigot Flows

With the prospects of the government announcing a re-bid in 2011, Lockheed has split with AgustaWestland and is now in bed with erstwhile rival Sikorsky.

Boeing, which had not attempted to get the presidential helicopter contract when it was doled out in 2005, has now teamed up with AgustaWestland, and bringing influence in the form of nearly $7 million in contributions to sitting politicians since 2001.

So the battle is — once again — just getting started. When the helicopter contract was scuttled, an angry Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D) — whose upstate New York district includes Owego, where Lockheed Martin was assembling the presidential helicopter — decried the move as “irrational and fiscally irresponsible.”

“This is far from over,” the Democrat said at the time. “We are going to continue to fight very aggressively for this project.”

Hinchey, who did not respond for comment, had received $43,500 from Lockheed Martin and its employees since 2001 — $9,000 of it coming last year as he was ramping up pressure to keep a contract alive for the nation’s biggest defense contractor with projects and offices across the country.

And Hinchey now has a new benefactor. From 2001 through 2009, the lawmaker received not one dime from Sikorsky.But since Sikorsky teamed up with Lockheed Martin on a new Marine One project proposal, it has handed him $2,500.

The two reconstituted teams, Boeing-AgustaWestland and Lockheed Martin–Sikorsky, have provided the Navy with brief outlines of what they could produce for the next fleet. The packages they submitted are classified, but they have publicly stated they would repackage the Sikorsky H-92 SuperHawk and the AgustaWestland AW101.

Politics aside, there appear to be few major advantages that either proposal has over the other, according to one expert.

Rhett Flater, executive director of the American Helicopter Society International, which has some 7,000 members, including the presidential helicopter players, thinks the government might choose birds from both bidding teams.

“They all could win. They all have fine aircraft,” he said. “I think the chatter is very inconclusive. I don’t hear anyone opining publicly that one program has got the odds against another program.”

The larger three-engine AW101 might be more suitable for shuffling the president around on shorter missions, while the smaller, two-engine Superhawk might be more efficient for longer and overseas missions, as the copters travel virtually everywhere the president goes, Flater said.

Regardless of the aircraft, piloting one is no small assignment, said retired pilot Lt. Col. Gene Boyer, who notched up about 580 presidential helicopter missions before retiring in 1975.

“You can’t even begin to think about what it’s like to fly the president. You got to get the idea that this is the president of the United States out of your mind,” Boyer said. “For the first few times, you’re kind of uptight. The worst times were when you’re in marginal conditions. You certainly don’t want to go down in history to be the guy that caused him to lose their life or have an accident. That’s pressure.”

Boyer was the man behind the helicopter controls in August 1974, when President Richard Nixon bid a nation goodbye with two outstretched arms, with hands in peace signs before boarding what was then Army One.